What’s the most delicious thing you’ve ever eaten?
I once went for a meal and decided to try Lobster thermidore. It was cooked with a mild cheese and wine sauce.
I don’t know how it was cooked, it was a special treat, but I’m glad I tried it.
I think its 15 to 20 years since I tried it but I still remember it. It was tasty and rich. But I wouldn’t be able to afford it now.
I guess, anything could be delicious if you have not had it before. If you don’t have money or resources you may never get to eat anything than the basic food, that you eat everyday if you are lucky. I’m not sure if I would eat it again now I think about their situation.
Six months after he died and I’m still stuck. It’s hard to move things, clear them away. I feel like I’m walking through treacle. I’ve got too much stuff, mine and his. I’m still holding tight to things.
Can I donate to charity? Or sell things? Or bin things? But I’m still attached. I can’t do anything but look at things, I rarely move any of it. My mind is fused into a lump of static thoughts, unable to move on.
Maybe I’m overdramaticising the situation? I don’t know, but I think it might take years to get sorted out. I’ve done a lot of the legal stuff and paperwork, but forty years of belongings, especially when you have been with someone for so long, are hard to organise.
Home I hear the accent of a fellow midlander and I’m home again. There’s a twang, a sound that I recognise. I tentatively ask them if they will say where they are from. Usually I get a friendly response. Then we discuss where we come from. Either the same town or close by. Memories of town centres, historic areas, parks and zoos. So many things have changed. But hearing a friendly voice takes me back over 40 years to when I left. I can’t go back, my family has all left, homes sold. Only a couple of relatives and friends left and I can’t drive far so it’s out of the question to go. But I’d like to drive down on a nostalgic trip. Some negotiation with friends required as I couldn’t get on a train on my own I don’t think. Anxiety is not a good friend.
The sitting bench became a potting bench. Now it’s become a rotting bench! Moss covered and with holes. It was never varnished and the rain over a few years just got to it. One day I will try and replace it with something more solid. Sad demise of an old friend. Hubby used to sit and read the paper on it.
Walking through the middle of Stoke today, there is a small patch of land next to a car wash that was seeded with wildflowers a few years ago. Every year I walk past and I’m amazed with what springs up. I think the local bees must be happy. Just down the road from there another patch of land in front of a large billboard has become overgrown with buddlea and grass and amazing clover flowers. I hope they don’t get cut down!
Self-care has been defined as the process of establishing behaviors to ensure holistic well-being of oneself, to promote health, and actively manage illness when it occurs. Individuals engage in some form of self-care daily with food choices, exercise, sleep, and hygiene.
I have to admit that I seem to be persuing self neglect instead although not self loathing thankfully. I do try to look after myself but things have been difficult and care takes energy and effort. I often think I should do things, but I don’t always have the wish to do them. When you have problems to deal with its hard to find the enthusiasm to keep going and do more.
One good thing I have done recently is to go back to yoga class which I had missed for several weeks due to injuring my toes. That has helped a bit. I have found that it has slightly helped me to relax.
We were out one day, and Hubby saw an old tandem across the floor of a garage. He went over to look at it and fell into an inspection pit. Luckily, he was OK!
We bought the tandem (which was two bikes welded together) and my hubby even took the local MP round Penkhull on it!
One day we rode 100 miles in a reliability trial with the local cycling club. It was fun and we got back in seven and a half hours, despite one of my pedals falling off and having to borrow a spanner to fasten it back in place. One chain wheel was on the opposite side of the tandem, so it had unscrewed….
All this happened about thirty years ago when I was a lot fitter.
We would take the tandem or our bikes out and explore the local countryside or cycle from Stoke up to Rochdale, or down to Walsall.
We decided to cycle up through Leek one day, then up to the Roaches. We saw a signpost for Flash so decided to take it (the highest village in England apparently). We were tired but swooped up and down the hills. But I was nervous, two of us going downhill on winding roads was nerve wracking! I was a bit scared and kept houting at my hubby to SLOW DOWN!
Eventually we came down and round a corner and……
We almost ran into a five pony, pony trek that was spread across the road. Hubby turned the handlebars and dropped us into a shallow ditch at the side of the road!
I admit cursing him for being so reckless. But we gathered ourselves back together and set off again uphill, then swiftly down again. I kept telling him to go slower. But he was enjoying himself and we had averted one disaster, what else could happen?
This time we came round a corner and just managed to stop, in front of a scout Jamboree. How many scouts and cubs? Goodness only knows. HUNDREDS of them! Hubby and I had been lucky not to hit one of them, like a skittle, probably knocking others over too!
Again, we got ourselves sorted out. By then I was ready to go home. We saw a TV mast somewhere up on the hills as we headed Westwards and soon, we were looking across the beautiful Cheshire plain, looking at peaceful and hopefully flat farmland to cycle home over. We stopped off at a place selling ice-cream before pedalling downhill towards Macclesfield or Congleton, to be honest I can’t remember because I was more bothered about the danger of going downhill too fast! I think I was probably very grateful that we got home in one piece!
My painting of a green woman is coming on. I did some more today. I’m adding more metallic colours, to bring out the sheen on the leaves. Also I want to improve the background of the image. Hopefully it will feel more coherent when it is finished. Acrylic on canvas.
The sky had clouded over, but there was a glow from the setting sun behind the grey clouds. It just shows that a minimal landscape can be enhanced by light and colour. There is blue and grey, orange and yellow, purples and blacks all intermingling and changing by the minute.
For once it wasn’t raining, it wasn’t cold, and it wasn’t windy. You could stand and watch the atmosphere evolve as the sun set. It’s not a very exciting sunset, but I enjoyed it.
Esther Chilton has a weekly prompt on her blog giving an idea to post a comment to. This week’s was PHOBIA.
Here’s my response:
My phobia is flying. I just won’t. Most of my family fly occasionally but I just can’t face it. For years my hubby wanted me to go to a local airport to see jets taking off and landing, but just seeing planes coming over a major road towards the airport was scary. The urge to duck was immense. Big metal tubes with wings, no I just can’t. I like spiders and snakes. I’ll visit aquaria and watch sharks. I’ve been on boats and trains, I can cope in a car, mainly if I’m driving. But the thought of nothing underneath me except air… Even if there were no windows, so I couldn’t see out and know I was in the air, and if there was no turbulence. I just am too afraid!
